Internal Award
US Citizenship Not Required

This award is available for full-time, currently enrolled Northeastern university undergraduates who have been accepted to present the outcome of their project at an appropriate external venue  (that is, this award is not for those who are “just attending” the event for networking and professional development only). We are also not able to support participation in a hackathon through this award.

Students who are co-authors or co-presenters of a paper, poster, presentation, or other original research or creative work should apply as a group, not as separate individuals. To ensure equitable distribution of resources, we may occasionally need to limit the number of awards made for attendance at a single conference or to members of a single research group. We may also condense separate but closely related individual presentations at the same conference by members of the same research group into a group application.

The research or creative work being presented must adhere to all university requirements, including policies related to the ethical conduct of research, the protection of human subjects, and the use of vertebrate animals in research.

You may apply for this award more than once, but students who have not previously received funding in the current academic year are given priority.

In light of the overall funding available, applications are evaluated for overall quality and for the potential benefit of attending the event to the student’s intellectual, personal, and professional development.

As the award covers up to 50% of attendance costs, the strongest applications will document other funding sources applied for or anticipated. Funding may be available through the event organizer, the applicant’s primary investigator, research supervisor or creative mentor, the applicant’s department or college, and the Northeastern University Honors Program, if applicable. (Do not write directly to the president, provost, or chancellor to request additional funding.) The total funds received by a student should not exceed the total expenses incurred.

We ask applicants to consider reasonable steps to minimize travel costs when practical, for example, sharing hotel rooms with other attendees and taking public transportation rather than cabs or ridesharing services.

You may apply for 50% of the total cost of attending a conference or other event at which you have been accepted to present your work, up to the maximum amounts listed below. Eligible expenses include registration or submission fees; printing and production costs (for posters, photographs, artworks, etc.); travel to the venue (air, bus, train, etc.); and lodging at the event location. Regardless of where you choose to have your poster printed, poster printing is covered at the standard NU Reprographics rate of $7 per square foot ($84 for a standard 3′ by 4′ poster). Meals are not a covered expense.

Maximum grants to individuals are:

• $500 for venues within the United States
• $750 for international venues.

Maximum grants to groups are:

• $1,000 for venues within the United States
• $1,500 for international venues.

After sharing their work, Shout-It-Out Awardees have the opportunity to reflect on their experiences.

Funding is not guaranteed, and applications are evaluated on the quality of the proposals and in light of the amount of funding available.

Applications are accepted and reviewed on a rolling basis, first-come, first-serve. The award process is competitive and funding is NOT guaranteed. Funding is also limited and the application will close when all funding has been allocated.

We ask that you apply at least three weeks before your travel date. We are not able to support travel that has occurred before the date of application.

Even if you are presenting with a group, please submit only one application for each presentation. If there are multiple undergraduate presenters for a project, please designate one student to initiate the application; this student will then invite the additional participants to join the application via the “Add Collaborators” feature of Northeastern’s Internal Fellowships Portal.

A complete application consists of a student proposal and a brief statement of support from the student’s research or creative mentor, which is submitted separately through Northeastern’s Internal Fellowships Portal. Applicants should discuss their plans for presenting their work with their mentors before submitting an application. After you enter your mentor’s contact information, the application system will automatically generate an email to them with instructions for submitting a statement of support. For students who have conducted research or creative endeavors at Northeastern, please provide the contact details for your Northeastern faculty mentor. If you are sharing the results of research or creative endeavors conducted outside Northeastern (for example, on a co-op or at a neighboring academic or medical institution), you may provide contact details for a mentor who is not a member of the Northeastern faculty.

Complete student proposals will include the following items, all of which should be submitted as PDF documents and uploaded through Northeastern’s Internal Fellowships Portal.

• A letter of intent (maximum 500 words). The letter should be drafted professionally and formally (addressed to Office of Undergraduate Research and Fellowships) and should include:
  • The name of the conference, competition, exhibition, festival, or other venue; its dates and location; and its status in your field. (Is it a major national or international conference in your discipline, covering many sub-fields? Is it the premier exhibition venue in your genre? Is it a regional event that will help you situate your work amongst that of nearby colleagues?)
  • A concise abstract of your project, written so that someone outside your field can understand it. (Generally speaking, the abstract you submitted to the event organizer is likely too technical or field-specific for a generalist audience to understand!)
  • An explanation of how presenting your work at this venue will benefit your academic, personal, and professional/postgraduate objectives. (Please cover all three types of goals.)
• A detailed, line-item budget listing all anticipated expenses and all sources of funding applied for or received. Please use the linked Budget Template to prepare your budget.
• Proof of your acceptance to present at the venue; or, for exhibitions, festivals, and other events that require submission fees, documentation of these fees
• A one-page résumé or CV for each presenter

If your mentor is a Northeastern faculty member, award funds will be disbursed directly into the faculty mentor’s university overhead account. Faculty mentors may pay for expenses on grantees’ behalf, or grantees may seek reimbursement from the faculty mentor’s department. If a student’s mentor is outside Northeastern, the student pays for expenses upfront and the Office of Undergraduate Research and Fellowships will process a reimbursement after the event.